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Cream of Cauliflower Soup

A creamy soup made from boiled cauliflower, onion, celery, and butter, thickened with flour and milk, seasoned with salt, pepper, and celery salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Cream of Cauliflower Soup

Why it works: Celery and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Cream of Cauliflower Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cauliflower

  1. Soak the cauliflower head in cold water for 1 hour.

  2. Cook the cauliflower in boiling salted water for 20 minutes.

  3. Reserve half of the florets and rub the remaining cauliflower through a sieve.

Make the soup

  1. Cook the onion, celery, and bay leaf in butter or drippings for 5 minutes, then remove the bay leaf.

  2. Add the flour and stir into the hot stock or water.

  3. Add the pureed cauliflower and milk.

  4. Season with salt and pepper.

  5. Strain the soup.

  6. Add the reserved florets.

  7. Reheat before serving.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Cauliflower + celerytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together488 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Cauliflower + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,113 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Cauliflower
Forms the bulk of the soup and, once pureed, gives it a smooth body.
Flour
Thickens the liquid as its starch swells with heat, giving the soup body.
Butter or drippings
Adds fat for richness and carries the flavor of the onion and celery.
Milk
Adds creaminess and softness, mellowing the soup's flavor and texture.
Stock or water
Serves as the main cooking liquid that the pureed vegetable and flour blend into.

The step that matters

Stirring the flour into the hot stock. Flour added to hot liquid can clump into lumps if it is not stirred in well. Stirring thoroughly helps the starch disperse evenly, so it thickens the soup smoothly as it heats.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cauliflower, flour, butter, milk, celery, pepper):

  1. Turnipfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cauliflower, flour, butter, milk, celery, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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